1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to medical devices. More particularly, the disclosure relates to a device or cutting assembly for cutting a suture in the body of a patient.
2. Background Information
Surgical sutures are one of the most commonly used medical devices, often used to stitch up an incision site or hold body tissues together. In the advent of minimally invasive surgical procedures, such incision sites can occur deep within the patient's body without easy access to the practitioner. To perform suturing, the practitioner ties a stitch or a knot outside of the body and pushes it down to the suture or incision site. However, the practitioner often has difficulty seeing where to cut the excess piece of suture material after the last knot is tied at the incision site. X-ray technology and cameras aids in visualization of equipment, but may do little to assist in visualization of the suture itself for making these remote cuts.
Additionally, even if the practitioner achieves sufficient visualization using a camera, he or she still may have difficulty preforming the remote cut with current cutting devices. Current cutting devices often must have sufficient flexibility to reach a remote suture site within the patient's body, but this flexibility reduces the strength necessary to make a sufficient, clean cut of the excess suture material. Further, some current cutting devices result in merely pushing the suture material, but failing to make a cut. There exists a need for a cutting device that solves the problems of sufficient remote visualization and cutting.